


Dust and Gold

by Beth_Mac



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Ficlet Collection, Multi, Parent Phil Coulson
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-11
Updated: 2018-05-11
Packaged: 2019-05-05 03:14:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,125
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14608050
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beth_Mac/pseuds/Beth_Mac
Summary: This is the dumping ground of deleted scenes, original/alternate scenes, fics I'll never finish, old plot summaries, scenes I've written for future works that may or may not see the light of day, and other odds and ends.Everything that appears here is fully up for adoption, with credit, unless noted otherwise.First chapter: The original ending to "She's Somebody's Hero".





	Dust and Gold

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As it says on the tin, this is the original end scene for [She's Somebody's Hero](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10914144).
> 
> Not up for adoption.

**2014**

The call goes out on a Wednesday morning. Audrey reads the text silently before telling Lena to get Addy and the go-bags. 

They've drilled for this. They know what to do. Audrey drives them out to the drop site where the girls are getting picked up. She hugs and kisses them one last time before they get onto a commandeered bus. 

Then she goes home to an empty house, and she waits.

* * *

In an eerie parallel, Robin is once again pounding on her door in the early afternoon. This time, she notices the silence when they sit to turn the T. V. on, and asks where the girls are. Audrey makes up a non-answer about a party or something. Robin seems to accept that. 

Audrey watches the footage of the helicarriers crashing into the Potomac with the same calm detachment she's used to get through the last two days, ever since Nick was attacked and Exodus went active. 

The newscasters are calling it SquidGate. They seem to be condemning HYDRA unilaterally, but they're much more hesitant about condemning SHIELD itself, to Audrey's relief.

* * *

Marcus Daniels is stalking her once again, and a woman is yelling at her to get in the car. This must be Simmons, the British biochemist. They take her to a safe house—safe apartment, really—with gray walls and blinds on the windows. 

"Phil never lied to me," she says, and the British woman and the black man stiffen, while Leo and Calypso hide smirks. 

"Phil?" Simmons says, sounding like it's a question. 

"Agent Phillip Coulson. In fact..." She looks around, knowing he must be talking to them somehow. Leo hands her his comm over Simmons's and the black man's squawks and she fits it to her ear. "Hello, Agent Handsome," she croons. 

"Hello, Miss Beautiful," he replies. "We're on our way up." 

A minute later, the door opens, and that's _her husband_ striding towards her, and even with the danger and the fear and the tension outside these walls, she feels like she's in a romantic comedy when he kisses her, slow and sweet. 

_"What,"_ the black man says flatly (she really needs to find out his name), but Leo is covering his eyes and going "NOPE!" and covering Calypso's eyes as well, although she's watching through his fingers and smiling. 

"Care to explain?" asks the young man with curly hair who followed Phil in. By the Scottish accent, this has to be... "You're Fitz, right? And that's Simmons, and I don't know your name." 

She shrugs at their expressions. "Phil's told me about you. And, of course, I've met Leo and Calypso before. You haven't broken too many bones, right?" she asks him. 

"Audrey, you're no fun," he whines. 

"Of course not, I'm never any fun," Audrey tells him. 

Phil interrupts. "Fitz, Simmons, Trip. Meet my wife, Audrey Nathan." He kisses the top her head. "Mother of my four children. Three children? Nah, let's go with four, Piper counts as much as our legal kids do." 

"Phil, you're ruining the moment," Audrey chides. 

She's set up to draw Daniels out, and it's the most terrifying moment of her life, being seemingly alone with him when she knows exactly what he's capable of and her only weapon is a cello. 

Once again, though, Phil and his team come to her rescue, destroying Daniels for good with a weapon that she probably shouldn't ask about. Afterwards, of course, the team has to leave and go back to their current base, where they've left Piper and the rest of the team to hold down the fort. 

(It turns out one of the teammates left behind is HYDRA. Melinda nail-guns his foot to the floor. Audrey has never been prouder.)

* * *

The comedians and the talk-show hosts seem to be coming to the same conclusions as the public: that most SHIELD agents didn't know about HYDRA, that the government as a whole—not just SHIELD—should be held accountable, and that SHIELD is going to permanently disband as the dust settles. 

And then Piper calls a press conference. 

_Interim Director McLean,_ the bulletin says, and Audrey is glad she's sitting down, and screw Melinda nail-gunning Ward, _this_ is her proudest moment. 

She can feel the shockwaves ripple around the world when Piper says she's only seventeen, and the Internet explodes in outrage. 

_WTF??_

_How could SHIELD get away with that?_

_Should've known something was wrong the minute they hired a minor._

Piper emphasizes that it was _her_ choice to join SHIELD, that no one pressured her into it. "I flew a nuclear weapon into a wormhole," she says, "to protect the people I love. Do you honestly think I would hesitate to take down the people who threaten them?" 

HERO has stepped up to the plate nicely. Even as SHIELD scrambles for warm bodies, Piper's people are out recruiting. 

SHIELD is returning to its roots, the SSR roots it never should have left in the first place. "From now on, SHIELD will be under the aegis of the United Nations," Piper says. "I'll be stepping down in favor of the remaining high command as soon as the dust settles. Then—" 

"What are you going to do now?" a reporter shouts. 

"We're going to do what we should have done from the start," she tells him. "Taking down HYDRA once and for all, and protecting humanity from the things that other agencies can't or won't investigate. 

"This is our world," she says, "and we are damned if we let it fall."

* * *

In the end, when the dust settles, not much changes. 

She's still Audrey Nathan, cellist, mother of four, and wife and mother of agents of SHIELD. The world is still a dangerous place, but hope is running rampant, and things are getting better. 

The Exodus kids come home after four weeks, and the Internet explodes again, this time in joy and photos and videos of parents reuniting with their children, and public opinion of SHIELD has never been higher. 

At six weeks, Piper steps down, and Phil and a woman named Victoria Hand become the Director and Deputy Director, mostly by default, since they're the highest-ranking agents who aren't evil, dead, or retired. 

After a year, Phil announces the HYDRA is dead and buried save for a few remaining pockets, and #CoulsonForPresident and #McLean2032 take over social media for a few days. 

In the end, really, nothing essentially changes. 

She still has callouses on her hands from of life of playing the cello. She's still the wife and mother of agents of SHIELD (although her husband is now the Director, and she _has_ to stop forgetting that). 

The world is still a dangerous place, but hope is running rampant, and life goes on.

**Author's Note:**

> In keeping with tradition, the fic title comes from a song I like: "[Dust and Gold,](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ryt4PI8v3KM)” by Arrows to Athens, more because of the title than the lyrics.


End file.
